“I hope so. I’m still learning. Winona has been here nearly a decade, so I depend on her a lot. So, yes on Snacks and Wine tonight? We’re serving a saucy cabernet from Painted Moon Winery. All the wines we serve are from Washington State.”

“Buy local,” he said lightly. “All right, I will see you at five.”

She shook her head. “I won’t be here. I wish I was going to be able to make it, but my sister Reggie is back for the holidays, and I’m going out with her and some friends. A girls’ night kind of thing at Holiday Spirits. It’s in The Wreath.”

“Is having your sister home a good thing or a bad thing?”

Her smile nearly blinded him. “It’s very good. We’re super close, and she’s been avoiding town for about a year now. She had a bad breakup last Thanksgiving. The guy she’d been dating proposed on Friday, they had a party to celebrate on Saturday and then he dumped her on Sunday. If I was big and burly, I would have beat him up.”

“You don’t seem vengeful.”

“I’m usually not, but this was a special circumstance.”

“I’m sure the judge and jury would have viewed it that way, too.”

She laughed. “I know it’s wrong to hurt someone, but he made me so mad. Who does that? If you ask me—” She stopped talking midsentence and looked at him.

“Sorry. I’ve been going on and on, and you’ve been very polite to listen to me. I’m going to leave you now to enjoy your morning while I get back to my dusting.”

“And Dolly,” he teased.

“Yes. And Dolly.”

Dena rose and collected their empty plates, along with her mug, and took them to the kitchen. Micah stayed where he was for a few more minutes, smiling when the music resumed. When the song ended, he went out a side door and walked over to the carriage house and his one-bedroom suite. Once inside, he got out his guitar and a pad of paper, then sat on the sofa and waited for inspiration.

Two hours later, he’d crossed out as many lines as he’d written and couldn’t come up with even the beginning of a melody. He’d hoped Wishing Tree would help with his creativity, but so far there wasn’t any magic to be found. If it wasn’t here, he wondered if it was anywhere. And if it wasn’t, the problem wasn’t the magic—it was him.

Reggie shivered in the cold night air. This time of year sunset was barely after four, so by seven, the temperature had seriously dropped. She wore a scarf, gloves and a hat, but she was still freezing by the time she and her sister arrived at The Wreath.